BDA – AGM #10
Pfeiffer public and private lecture
Before addressing the issues of the day Dr Pfeiffer gave an address concerning recent biodynamic research achieved over time including his time in the USA during the war. The report of this address was headed “
Dr E. Pfeiffer’s Address
Given at the 10th Annual General Meeting of the Bio-Dynamic Association
to which Members of the Anthroposophical Agricultural Foundation had been invited.
Alliance Street, SW1, London,
Thursday, 13th July 1950 11am
The precis was: Dr. Pfeiffer then went on and expressed the wish that the BDA & AAF be united: the BDA Newssheet could be suitable for outside work & the public whereas AAF N&C more for internal work & refining. Dr Mier personally favourable.
The final story starts with the 10th AGM of the Biodynamic Association on 13th July 1950 at The Alliance Hall London SW1. Dr Pfeiffer attended as part of a UK Tour, the first for ten years in the UK. The Chair Rolf Gardiner welcomed him to the meeting. His address was challenging and dramatic saying that he would definitely resign as President and the work should be carried by British staff. He went on to say – and it is faithfully reported in the Minutes – that his influence in The USA was such that a manager of a large Fertilizer Company had said that if we accept your ideas some 300,000 persons would be unemployed – the bottom would have fallen out of their lives – and you have to take care of the unemployed. A deeply responsible approach in some ways because Pfeiffer goes on to say that to guide things in the right way it is necessary not only to transform industries but also to assume social responsibilities. Then a bombshell when he says that social responsibilities are what The Anthroposophical Society has not assumed.
He goes on to chide the two organisations for always looking at differences and not acknowledging achievement – in a living organism the organs do not criticise, but help one another.
He then prescribed how the two organisations might be united.